The volcanic eruption at Eyjafjallajökull continues, but, for now at least, is a “tourist eruption”, as nice as they get, with a huge flood of tourists to the mountain on clear days and a boom industry in getting sightseers out to the mountain.

The original fissure that erupted has closed after building up a nice cinder cone, but the second fissure mostly consolidated into a single crater which continues strong.
The mountain is still rumbling and swelling, suggesting magma continues to flow under the crust, and there are occasional burps from next door neighbour Katla – which is big bad volcano in the complex, and one which promptly erupted after the last couple of eruptions in Eyjafjallajökull.

Sadly, two people have died going to the volcano – not with the volcanism as the proximate cause, their SUV got stuck in bad weather and they were ill prepared for the conditions, two of three people left the vehicle and died of exposure.

The environmental ministry has requested local sheriff investigate (in Icelandic): not for recklessness or stupidity, but because off-road driving is prohibited in the area now that the ground in no longer frozen
Seriously.

SciblingEruptions does regular updates, with interesting speculation and news in the comments.

“The environmental ministry has requested local sheriff investigate (in Icelandic): not for recklessness or stupidity, but because off-road driving is prohibited in the area now that the ground in no longer frozen
Seriously.”

Actually, that makes sense to me — wet turf that hasn’t quite awakened from its winter nap under snow is quite fragile.

Oh yes, off-road driving in the highlands when the ground is thawed leaves scars for decades. Its just that I think the ground up there is still frozen, except where is it molten – which is of course where they drove – across molten rock.

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